If Wlad beats Haye he's an ATG

I wouldn't go that far.

They're all meaningless trinkets in my mind.

That said, Klitschko has *never* held the only title that really matters - the Linear title.

 

So You say that Patterson had better opposition? So Holmes is not and ATG?
I don't understand where your reasoning coming from.

 

Wlad is already there IMO. do you know this guy's record vs top ten opposition?

he's 18-2-0 with 15 knockouts against noteworthy opponents. very few heavyweights in history can better that.

Since the loss to Brewster he has changed from a joke to the most dominant heavyweight this side of lennox lewis.

He has soundly dominated all of his opposition after claiming the number 1 spot of Chris Byrd. very few champions have been so consistantly dominant. that's 5 years now he has been accepted as the best heavyweight on the planet, a claim he would later legitimise against chagaev where by he received the ring championship belt.

Losing to Haye will not undo his 5 year reign of terror, it will only promote haye's ranking and stop wlad's from getting any better. his body of work so far is solid enough to call this guy a great.

 

debatable at best.

the ring awarded it vs chag and that's good enough for me.

 

Yet Haye is dismissed so readily by the vast majority of Wlads fans, so how can it be counted as a big victory?

 

That was a terrible decision by the Ring & it made me question their credibility. Chagaev had looked awful since he contracted Hepatitis. So awful that Chag looked very poor & struggled against a nobody called Matt Skelton. I honestly don't think men suffering from Hepatitis or similar illnesses should be allowed to fight for titles, until they are cured.

 

What if he loses a close decision that is considered a great fight? What if he wins a rematch? Losing doesn't always destroy a legacy. Willie Pep lost 3 of 4 to Saddler and has a pretty good legacy.

 

Well it was clear that vitali would never try to challenge his brother's position plus chag had beaten ruiz, valuev and skelton to establish himself as the next best heavyweight.

Not always 1 v 2 decides a new champion.

When robinson won the welterweight championship he did not face the number 2 welterweight.

The ring is the only belt that won't strip (as long as it's in circulation). All the ring champs of today have no lineage to contest with. It is generally ring rankings used when deciding lineage anyways (chavez v taylor for example). It aint perfect but it's the best we have.

 

A lot of it depends on how the fight goes.

Let's assume just a second Wlad wins. How does he win? Is it an easy-peasy domination where Haye lands nothing whatsoever and then takes a dive from a jab? Then Haye was just a random nobody who happened to be hyped up but never had a chance at the elite HW level. In that scenario I don't see a win adding to Wlad's current resume.

Or does Wlad have to fight hard for a victory, maybe recovering from a knockdown or two himself to come back and win this in the later rounds. Then Haye proved his worth, he proved he could hang with an elite HW for the distance of a fight and even push him to the border of defeat.

IMO this will make a big difference in assessing how this (potential) win will contribute to Wlad's legacy.

 

Chagaev was WBA champ and fought better opposition than Haye at HW. He was clearly at the top of the pack at the time.

 

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CidwfLRdTIo[/ame]

 

:good

 

Pretty much spot on mate.

 

Haye is a disgraceful bum and a glass jawed joke. He was standing in front of someone like Harrison for ****ing 10 minutes and couldn´t get anything done now hes supposed to pose a threat to Wladimir Klitschko who is miles better in everything Haye can do than he is and can do a lot of more things Haye has never seen before plus he has perfectly defended himself against punches from the only range Haye can operate at remotely well for years. Its a joke and taking fraudulent disgrace Haye apart will not make him an atg. Unless Wlad beats Vitali I´ll not rate him as an atg no matter what. Hayes career best performance was against semi retired Ruiz who he rabbit punched into submission now people think hes a decent finisher.. what a dazzler

 

I wasnt listing all of my personal ATGs admittedly Holmes was a better example than Patterson. My point was not so much to boast a better list of ATGs as it was to say that Wlad is the best of HIS time as opposed to one of the best of ALL TIME.
Would Wlad have performed as spectacularly in the 1940s facing off against the best in the division at THAT time? I do not believe so. So to say that he is the best of ALL TIME (which is what ATG is saying) is to me overating his ranking.